The Ship who Sang

Locations
Call Number: Science Fiction / McCaffrey, Anne, Adult Book / Fiction / Science Fiction / General / Mccaffrey, Anne
On Shelf At: Downtown Library

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	Science Fiction / McCaffrey, Anne	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Malletts Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Science Fiction / General / Mccaffrey, Anne	4-week checkout	Due 05-05-2024

"A Del Rey book."
The ship who sang -- The ship who mourned -- The ship who killed -- Dramatic mission -- The ship who dissembled -- The partnered ship.
Helva had been born human, but only her brain had been saved and implanted into the titanium body of an intergalactic scout ship. But first she had to choose a human partner--male or female--to share her exhilarating escapades in space. Her life was to be rich and rewarding, resplendent with daring adventures and endless excitement, beyond the wildest dreams of mere mortals. Gifted with the voice of an angel and being virtually indestructible, Helva XH-834 anticipated a sublime immortality. Then one day she fell in love!

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COMMUNITY REVIEWS

VERY of Its Time submitted by Meginator on August 24, 2020, 6:42pm Content Warning: latent ableism
Hoo boy, is this a book of its time. That’s not a criticism, exactly, but Anne McCaffrey’s treatment of disabled characters and second-wave feminism are assuredly products of the 1960s, as forward-thinking as they may have been in their time. Despite this, McCaffrey goes to great pains to provide her main character, Helva, with intelligence and to give her agency over her own life, even if Helva is often defined by her relationships with men. Helva’s mind has been seamlessly integrated into an intergalactic spaceship’s central operating system, and her various adventures provide the basis for this episodic story cycle. Though the book lacks fully fleshed out character development, Anne McCaffrey’s imagination is vibrant and the alien worlds and adventures she imagines are enthralling even today, with some surprisingly high stakes. One story finds Helva confronting the all-encompassing power of deep grief, and another robs her of physical power and places her in a frightening race against time, but the highlight is a riff on drama class that imagines a wholly different method of communication and considers its implications for someone who lacks the ability to directly manipulate the physical world around them. This book has some problematic aspects, to be sure, and it lies on the adventure-heavy side of the speculative fiction spectrum, but it does offer some thrilling adventures and some interesting launching points for philosophical consideration, even if McCaffrey never does fully engage them.